Food/Groceries – Page 85

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Can’t I Just Buy One?

January 11, 2016 by Edgar (aka MrConsumer)

For several years now, supermarkets have tried to get you to buy more with offers like “10 for $10.” Savvy shoppers know when you see offers like that, you are not required to buy 10 units to get the $1 each price. You can buy as few as you want and only pay the mathematical equivalent of that number.

Drug stores like Walgreens and Rite Aid have gotten a bit more clever by advertising “2-fer” or “3-fer” offers like 2 for $10 or 3 for $2, but then in small print indicate if you only want one, you will pay more, sometimes significantly more.

*MOUSE PRINT:

In this case, if you just want one pack of gum it is 99 cents — 50% more than the sale price.

Not wanting to be left out of being able to charge more if you just want one sale item, supermarkets are beginning to mimic drug store pricing policies on some items. Here are some examples of supermarkets requiring the purchase of multiple items in order to take advantage of the sale price:

*MOUSE PRINT:

3 for $9

buy 3 shoprite

Sometimes it is clearly stated that you must buy the advertised quantity to get the advertised price. Other times, the disclosure is not conspicuous, and they don’t always tell you how much one will cost you if that is all you want.

Stores may be counting on the fact that most shoppers don’t scrutinize ads or their sales receipts with many items on it, and won’t catch the higher price if they only buy one of the advertised items.

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Here We Downsize Again 2015 (Part 4)

March 14, 2022December 21, 2015 by Edgar (aka MrConsumer)

Note: The next new Mouse Print* story will appear on January 4th.

We end the year with our final installment of products that have undergone the shrink ray.

*MOUSE PRINT:

Thanks to our ever vigilant Richard G. for catching Gillette deodorant going from a full four ounces to 3.8. And you still can’t carry it on an airline.

*MOUSE PRINT:

We’ve seen the smaller boxes of Kleenex tissues get smaller over the years, but Albert L. found that they shrunk at Costco as well. In this case, each box in the 10-pack is now shy 30 tissues. Put another way, you are missing more than a whole box now from every 10-pack.

*MOUSE PRINT:

Frankie found and took a wonderful picture of Campbell’s Spaghetti, which went from 14-3/4 ounces to 14.2 ounces. Surprisingly, the can is noticeably smaller despite such a small decrease in contents.

*MOUSE PRINT:

Tim B. discovered that Walmart lopped off more than 12% from their Great Value mixed nuts, bringing cans down to an even pound from 18.25 ounces. The price also went up from a reported $7.98 to $8.84. Combined, that is the equivalent of a 26% price increase, making it not such a “Great Value.”

*MOUSE PRINT:

Finally, Richard G. found that Soda Stream, which makes flavor concentrates so you can make your own soda, changed their packaging and a lot more. The old bottle made 50 eight-ounce servings of soda and cost $7.99. The new version only makes 29 glasses, but the price dropped by $2. Fair deal? Not at all. The customer is now getting 40% fewer glasses of soda, but the price only went down by 25%.

If you spot a product that has been downsized, send MrConsumer an email at edgar(at symbol)mouseprint.org . And if you can take a sharp photograph of the old and new product labels, that would be great too.

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Holy Cow, How Wise is Milkwise?

December 14, 2015 by Edgar (aka MrConsumer)

Have you checked out the dairy aisle lately? There are all these newfangled milk products on the shelf, all claiming in one way or another to be better than plain old milk.

One such product in New England stores is Hood (brand) Milkwise.

It’s got one-third the sugar, almost half the calories, and 50 percent more calcium than even reduced fat milk. How did they do that… put the cows on a low fat and low carb diet?

The answer is in the fine print.

*MOUSE PRINT:

They watered it down — water is now the first ingredient — plus they added calcium and sugar. That is why it is called a “milk beverage” instead of milk. This product is reminiscent of Trop50, the “orange juice beverage” that claimed 50% fewer calories because it is basically orange juice diluted with a lot of water.

But the Milkwise label makes it seem so healthy. How can this be? The trick is that they left out one key attribute of milk in the comparison — protein. We’ve taken the liberty of filling in the blanks.

*MOUSE PRINT:

Milkwise only has one-quarter the protein of regular milk. Expressed the other way, regular milk has four times the protein of Milkwise.

Maybe it should be called Milk-not-so-wise.

Thanks to Dr. W who was driving along the highway in Saugus, Massachusetts and saw a Milkwise billboard with a mother and child. She thought the ad was suggesting that this was a healthier milk product.